


To Say Nothing of the Kitten

by lalalalalawhy



Category: Oxford Time Travel Universe - Connie Willis, Two Monks Inventing Things (The Toast)
Genre: Gen, Just Add Kittens, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-10
Updated: 2016-10-10
Packaged: 2018-08-20 13:54:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8251498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lalalalalawhy/pseuds/lalalalalawhy
Summary: "Right," said Mr. Dunworthy. "So the kitten chased a butterfly down the hallway. I still don't understand how this could have thrown into chaos the entire timeline.""Well," Badri said, "I had just stepped away from the console..."





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Bethynyc](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bethynyc/gifts).



 

> "To gain the friendship of a cat is a difficult thing. The cat is philosophical, metholodical, quiet animal, tenacious of its own habits, fond of order and cleanliness, and it does not lightly confer its friendship. If you are worthy of its affection, a cat will be your friend, but never your slave. He keeps his free will, though he loves, and he will not do for you what he thinks is unreasonable. But if he once gives himself to you it is with absolute confidence and affection"
> 
> \-- Theophile Gautier, 1850
> 
> "Cursed be the pesty cat that urinated over this book during the night."
> 
> \--Unknown Medieval Monk, upon discovering his manuscript had been peed on in the night.

 

* * *

James Dunworthy sighed and rubbed both temples with his forefingers. “Okay,” he said, defeatedly. “Start again, and tell me what happened. Ned first.”

* * *

What had happened was this.

An agent of unbridled chaos, a beautiful member of _clade rhopalocera_ had flitted with the breeze through an open window and into the joint office of Ned Henry and Verity Kindle, Oxford Historians both. The butterfly landed on the corner of a lavender pillow atop a bookshelf upon which happened to be napping a small feline creature -- no longer a kitten but not yet fully grown.

Penwiper lifted one eyelid, lazily, and considered the butterfly. The butterfly flapped its wings once and both of Penwiper’s eyes snapped open, pupils wide. Slowly, slowly, she pulled herself into pounce position, shifting her weight on her back paws back and forth, getting... ready… to…

Suddenly! the butterfly flapped its wings and flitted away, just out of the reach of Penwiper’s grasping paws. She jumped down from her perch, and the chase was on.

Verity looked up from her paperwork, a mess of jump request forms, costume requisition paperwork, and pages and pages microfiche copies detailing French women’s fashion from 1730-1775. “Hey, kitty,” she said, gazing down the hall at the kitten still giving chase to the butterfly. “Penwiper! Where are you going?”

Ned Henry looked up from his work as well. “Should be fine,” he said. “Probably just anxious to get out of this office and work the kinks out. Can’t say I blame her,” he said, stretching his arms up and rolling his shoulders back. Still... “I’ll go get her,” he said.

“I’m coming too,” Verity said, rising from her desk. “You know it’ll probably take both of us if she doesn’t want to get caught.”

* * *

"Right," said Mr. Dunworthy. "So the kitten chased a butterfly down the hallway. I still don't understand how this could have thrown into chaos the entire timeline."

"Well," Badri Chadhury said, "I had just stepped away from the console..."

* * *

Four jumps in one go was just too much to program, Badri thought. True, when they'd been working on what he'd come to call The Madness with Lady Schrapnell, he had done far more. The new regulations put into place after The Madness generally kept the historians sane and the timeline fairly uncomplicated. Still, there were times when everything stacked up just right, and he had to spend the entire morning at the console, caressing the fabric of spacetime into just the right shape.

Still, Badri was good at his job, and he had the net ready to go fifteen minutes before the historians were set to leave. Perfect. Just enough time for tea.

Just as Badri stepped around the corner to put the kettle on, Penwiper came skidding into the room. She jumped up, swiping a paw at the butterfly. The butterfly flitted over the console, and Penwiper was close behind, jumping first to Badri's seat, then to the keyboard (managing to press a few errant buttons on the way). The butterfly, which had so far escaped all of Penwiper's attempts to subdue it, flitted over to the tent. It landed there, flapping its wings beguilingly.

Penwiper crouched down, readying herself for the final blow. She shimmied her hindquarters back and forth, shifting her weight, waiting for the perfect moment. And...

"Hey!" shouted Badri, coming around the corner just in time to see Penwiper spring from his console, depressing the "On" button as she leapt away. His voice startled the kitten, who twisted in midair. The butterfly took off once more, darting into tent. Penwiper, having missed her mark by a considerable margin, landed in that half-graceful, half-awkward way that teenaged kittens have, and skidded to a halt under the tent.

Badri raced over to the console just in time to see he was too late. The net flashed, and both Penwiper and, presumably, the butterfly, were gone.

* * *

Mr. Dunworthy took his glasses off and began to clean them. "I think perhaps you'd better tell me about the jumps we had programmed for today."

* * *

Penwiper, for her part, had been in a bag the last time she'd traveled through the net. Between that and being a kitten, she had no real way to understand what was happening to her. There was a bright light, and then darkness.

* * *

Badri took a deep breath, then held up four fingers.

“Today we had four jumps scheduled for a team of two, per the new protocol of doubling up for jumps prior to 1600,” he began.

Dunworthy’s eyes widened. Four jumps was too many, even for two historians. They had implemented two-historian protocol that week, though it was based on two events: the stranding of Kivrin Engle and the more recent success of two historians, currently seated before him, in helping each other out of sticky situations. Though… it didn’t seem to be helping them now.

“Dirk Nguyen is doing preliminary research on a historical survey of brick making and laying practices,” Badri continued, “and Melanie Johnson is studying medieval monastic scribe work in the thirteenth century.”

“So Nguyen and Johnson were scheduled to jump?”

“Actually, no. Emily Randolph and Patricia Hamidou, from the costuming department, were doing quick jumps in order to prepare for outfitting them.”

Dunworthy resisted the urge to put his head in his hands and instead leaned up against the desk behind him. “Brilliant,” he said, crossing his arms. “Assuming the cat somehow managed to activate the course you had programmed into the machine-” he began.

“It appears it did,” Badri said. According to the logs, somehow the kitten had managed to hit all the correct buttons to set the course.

“...Fine,” Dunworthy said. “That cat is now headed toward the first of four jumps. Best case scenario, the cat manages to complete the sequence and arrives back here at what time?”

“Twenty-five minutes from now,” Badri said. “The jumps were meant to be completed quickly -- seven minutes apiece. They were scouting missions, nothing more.”

“Then we shall wait and prepare.” Dunworthy said, standing up and pointing to each of the them in turn. “Badri, you need to get to work preparing duplicate jumps to each location. But please leave me the timeline detailing what jump is open when. I want to keep track.”

Badri nodded, handed over his print out, and began gathering his notes.

“Ned and Verity, technically, this is your mess. You need to prepare yourself for a retrieval mission.” Ned’s hand found Verity’s and gripped it reassuringly.

Dunworthy surveyed the historians before him, leaning back on the desk and crossing his arms once again. “I’m sure I need not impress upon you the importance of this. You know the old adage about the butterfly?” he asked.

Everyone nodded.

“Just imagine the trouble a kitten could get up to.”

What Mr. Dunworthy didn’t know, of course, was that a butterfly had made its way in as well.

He looked down at the paper Badri had handed him. “Mohenjo-daro, Modern-day Pakistan; 86 BC,” he read. It was going to be a long twenty minutes.

* * *

**Mohenjo-daro, 86 BC**

At that very moment (or not, given the nature of time travel), more than two millennia and a continent away, a small kitten flashed into existence, chasing a small butterfly.

This turn of events went unnoticed by most in the brick yard. Brick-making is arduous work, requiring concentration, strength, and skill.

In the way of cats everywhere, when faced with the grandeur of human achievement, Penwiper appreciated it not at all.

Penwiper's attention was centered on the butterfly, swiping at it as it careened through the air. She trotted past the workers in the mud pit, past a couple of sleeping dogs, toward the area where finished bricks were laid to dry in the sun.

Only… one of the dogs was not quite as asleep as it appeared. He smelled a strange and tantalizing smell, and opened his eyes. Before him he saw a foreign creature, fluffy and feline, and he did what any self-respecting canine would in the situation.

Penwiper’s curious and playful chase of the butterfly forgotten, she suddenly found herself sprinting for her life. She dashed across the open field of drying bricks, dog hot on her tail. She could feel puffs of his breath behind her as she scampered desperately, darting right and left, looking for an escape.

"Hey!" yelled one of the bricklayers, as the cat and dog ran through the rows of drying bricks. 

There! Right by her old pal the fluttering butterfly, she spotted a familiar glimmer. It meant escape. She led the dog as far away from it as she dared, then turned suddenly and dashed headlong into the glimmer.

* * *

**Gloucester, Roman Britain, 100 AD**

Penwiper tumbled out of the net, panting, and looked around cautiously. The dog seemed not to have followed.

This new place smelled more like home. Her tail relaxed a fraction and she began bathing herself, trying to get the clay and grime off of her paws.

Suddenly caught a glimpse once more of the butterfly, resting itself on some grass in the meadow. She stretched and trotted toward it, but it flitted away right before she could catch it. She took a swipe at the butterfly, and it drifted away, just out of reach. She dashed after it with renewed purpose.

...Right into another bit of mud. She didn't know it, but this jump had taken her to a field full of drying bricks and roof tiles. Penwiper only knew she did not enjoy the sensation of soft clay against her paw pads. She tried to touch the ground as little as possible as she chased the butterfly.

On the second lap of the field of bricks, two things happened at once. First, the brick makers noticed her presence, and began to shout and clap at her. Second, the glimmer started up again. Once again, she hopped into the net, cajoling the butterfly to come along with her.

* * *

**England, 1420**

Sometimes, a kitten has needs. After an exhausting twenty minutes of chasing and being chased, Penwiper needed somewhere to pee.

She found a soft surface, elevated and safe. She went about her business with as much decorum as she could, and was just finishing up when a monk’s voice could be heard to shout, “Ho! What's this now?”

She looked up, quickly, and sure enough, saw a man advancing toward her table and the glimmer of her escape portal. It had not failed her yet. She dashed in, leaving one very confused monk and one moderately damp manuscript.

The next morning, when the vellum had dried enough, the monk dipped his pen in the ink, and drew an image of the cat he had seen. He drew hands pointing to the stain on his book, and scrawled, “Here is nothing missing, but a cat urinated on this during a certain night. Cursed be the pesty cat that urinated over this book during the night in Deventer and because of it many others too.”

He sighed, and thought for a moment before continuing. “And beware well not to leave open books at night where cats can come.”

* * *

**England, 1445**

You know the phrase “out of the frying pan, into the fire?” Unfortunately, Penwiper did not.

The net opened up right on top of a long wooden table where two monks were hard at work, copying holy texts. The monks were deep in a conversation.

“You know how snails are large and terrifying?” one monk said to the other.

“Of course!” the second monk said.

“Can knights ride on them?”

“Only when jousting,” the second monk said.

“Right,” said the first monk, “say no more.” He went back to drawing his terrifying snail beasts, sketching knights with lances sitting astride them.

Just then, Penwiper and the long-suffering butterfly were both dumped out right between them, knocking over one of the inkwells.

“Cursed creature!” one of the monks yelled, standing up suddenly from the table. Penwiper leapt to the ground and began to run, avoiding the monks as they tried to catch her.

It turns out catching a kitten is quite difficult, provided one is also arguing over what kind of beast it might be. One monk was certain she was a vanishing lion, and the other was convinced she must be a demon sent from Hell.

Penwiper took the opportunity to find a high ledge and wait for the glimmer she was sure would soon come.

* * *

**Oxford, England, Present day**

Badri, Ned, Verity, and Mr. Dunworthy all held their breath and watched the spot where, God willing, a small kitten would materialize in about ten seconds.

Badri began the countdown, quietly counting backwards from ten. At two, the net opened, and out came a kitten, no worse for the wear, trotting triumphantly straight to Ned and Verity, with a butterfly in her mouth.

Everyone in the room let out the breath they’d been holding. Dunworthy gave a signal to Badri, who shut the net down. It would remain down for the rest of the day while they assessed damage.

She leapt up on Ned’s trousers and climbed her way to his shoulder, making very proud kitten noises all the while. She deposited the still-living butterfly atop his head, and settled down to take a much-deserved nap.

Ned held very still before slowly walking over to an armchair. Verity giggled at the mess Penwiper had made of Ned’s outfit. He was streaked with red mud and black ink. She supposed the folks whose drops these were meant to be would appreciate the chance to take a look at the samples, and made a mental note to herself ask them before Ned washed his trousers.

Later, they would have a very serious meeting about non-human-net interaction and protocol, as well as more rules about pets in the offices. For the time being, however, everyone was relieved to simply watch a sleeping kitten.

**Author's Note:**

> What a prompt! I was inspired last Yuletide, and looked up all the links of things I’d seen with kitten prints on them, and then life happened, and I completely forgot until I opened up my Yuletide folder this year. I couldn’t not write it!
> 
> The Indian brick can be seen at [this link (Yahoo group)](https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/IndiaArchaeology/attachments/1386278620?itemid=1039169896) and indicates an actual dog chase! The cat was likely a leopard cat and not a house cat because a) the size of the paw print and b) house cats were not hanging out in India in 86 BC. Also, I set the brick making in [Mohenjo-daro](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohenjo-daro), one of the first instances of brick construction ever.
> 
> Roman England in about 100 BC boasts a couple of different clay pieces with cat prints! Here’s the [roof tile](http://www.seeker.com/2000-year-old-cat-paw-prints-discovered-on-tile-1770078512.html) and the [brick](http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/02/1-kitty-2-empires-2-000-years-world-history-told-through-a-brick/273320/), which now lives in Washington state! I decided to place them together, for ease of narrative kitten paws. 
> 
> [Here](https://medievalfragments.wordpress.com/2013/02/22/paws-pee-and-mice-cats-among-medieval-manuscripts/) are images of both of the manuscripts, marked by cats in their own way half a century ago.
> 
> Finally, here is an image of [snail jousting](http://65.media.tumblr.com/7074cb6e98f72f50eabcecb15ab98ae0/tumblr_inline_ndimqclnXo1rq29x2.jpg).


End file.
